8
Supernova
Polly
Thedoorslamsshutbehind us and for one heartbeat the room is absolute darkness.
Then Rynn’s body ignites.
Not fire. Not heat shimmer. His micro-scales—the intricate lattice that covers his chest, his shoulders, the vulnerable sides of his ribs—begin to glow. Soft at first, like embers banking in a dying fire. Then brighter, pulsing in time with his heartbeat until the entire room is bathed in amber-gold light.
“Holy shit,” I breathe.
He’s bioluminescent. My alien noble is literally glowing, and it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
The patterns trace along every muscle, highlighting the architecture of his body like someone drew him in liquid gold. The scales aren’t flat anymore—they’re flared, sharp-edged, creating shadows and peaks that make him look like he’s armored in light itself.
“Polly.” My name is a growl, subsonic vibration wrapped around vowels. His eyes are completely black, only thin rings of molten gold remaining. Fangs fully extended. Hands flexing, claws catching the light.
He looks like a god. A monster. A nightmare made of hunger and need.
And I’ve never wanted anything more in my entire life.
“You’re glowing,” I say stupidly, because my brain has apparently short-circuited.
“Zha’keth mar—” He’s speaking something that isn’t Basic, the words flowing like music and gravel combined. “Sha’ren vaess, kethara min—”
“Basic,” I demand, backing toward the bunk because my knees are about to give out. “I want to know exactly what you’re promising to do to me.”
His smile is all predator. “I said: Mine at last. My mate. My everything.”
Oh fuck.
He stalks forward—there’s no other word for it—and the temperature in the small room spikes so dramatically that sweat breaks out across my skin. The air is thick, humid, crackling with electricity that has nothing to do with the ship’s systems and everything to do with the alien who’s looking at me like I’m the only thing in the universe that matters.
“Your shirt,” I manage, because I need something to ground me before I combust. “Get it off.”
He looks down at himself—at the expensive Aethel-weave shirt that probably cost more than Pink Slip’s last three repair jobs combined—and I see the exact moment he decides he doesn’t care about preserving it.
He grabs the collar with both hands and rips.
Fabric shreds like paper, buttons scattering across the deck with sharp pings. The shirt joins his jacket on the floor in a crumpled heap of ruined finery, and then there’s nothing between me and all that glowing, alien skin.
“Come here,” he orders, and there’s so much command in those two words that my feet move before my brain catches up.
I reach for him with shaking hands, and the moment my palms make contact with his chest I gasp. The temperature difference is staggering—he’s burning up, easily over 110 degrees—but it’s not painful. It’s perfect. Heat soaking into my hands, radiating up my arms, making me want to press my entire body against him and never let go.
But it’s the texture that makes me pause.
Smooth human-like skin across his pectorals, his abdomen. Then the scales—those beautiful, alien scales—rising in intricate patterns along his ribs, his sides, disappearing beneath the waistband of his trousers. They’re not smooth. They’re sharp-edged where they’re flared, catching against my fingertips, and the contrast between soft skin and hard scale is mesmerizing.
I trace one line of scales from his sternum down to his hip, watching them pulse brighter under my touch, a living constellation flaring to life beneath my fingertips.
Rynn freezes.
Goes absolutely still, every muscle locked, breath caught somewhere between inhale and exhale. I can feel the tremor he’s fighting to hide, the way his whole body is braced for rejection. Waiting for me to flinch. Waiting for me to pull away from the sharp, alien parts of him that his family spent generations teaching him to be ashamed of.
Instead, I lean forward and press my lips to the scales on his ribs, soft at first, just the barest brush of mouth on cool, smooth plating. They warm instantly under the kiss, glowing brighter, and I feel the shiver that rolls through him like distant thunder.
